Film to examine LaFuente case

Published 2:07 pm, Wednesday, October 24, 2012

A first-time documentary filmmaker has turned to the Internet to seek funding for a project that he hopes will lead to freedom for a Plainview man.

Richard LaFuente, who is half Sioux Indian and half Mexican American, is one of 11 American Indians convicted in the 1983 death of former police officer Edward Peltier in North Dakoka.

A Plainview resident at the time, LaFuente was visiting friends and relatives in North Dakota when Peltier reportedly was run over and killed. Three years later, in 1986, LaFuente was arrested in Plainview and returned to North Dakota where he and 10 others were convicted of murder by a federal court.

“He is now being held in a federal prison in Fort Worth, and in his 26th year of a life sentence,” said his 27-year-old daughter, LeDena LaFuente of Lubbock. “I was just 10 months old when the FBI came to Plainview and arrested him. My sister was 2 or 3 at the time.”

LeDena LaFuente recently moved to Lubbock, while her sister and mother, who has since remarried, remain in Plainview.

“We all hope that this documentary will draw new attention and publicity to my father’s case, because he is an innocent man who deserves to be free.”

A press release, issued Saturday, explains, “First-time documentary filmmaker Todd Trotter is turning to the Internet to raise funds to produce and direct ‘Incident At Devils Lake,’ a feature length documentary film that will deconstruct one of the most controversial federal murder cases in the history of North Dakota — and hopefully serve as a catalyst to help exonerate the last remaining inmate, who many, including advocates and lawyers at the Innocence Project of Minnesota, believe was wrongly convicted.”

Issued in Los Angeles, that press release explains that Peltier was found dead on the Devils Lake Sioux Indian Reservation near Ft. Totten, N.D.

“LaFuente and his co-defendants, many of whom were teenagers at the time, proclaimed innocence from the outset, and all have been released except LaFuente,” it explains.

“I first learned about the case from a chilling article in Texas Monthly magazine,” the release quotes Trotter, who was so disturbed by the facts that he called the writer of the article, Michael Hall, and asked him if he could arrange a phone call with LaFuente in prison.

“The phone rang one Saturday morning and it was Richard, calling from the federal prison in Texas. This began a series of regular Saturday morning phone calls — my own kind of personal Tuesdays with Morrie, but with a prison inmate, who I soon suspected had been scapegoated by a complacent federal justice system,” said Trotter, whose father is an attorney.

During the past year, Trotter said he has being gathering evidence and testimony to prove LaFuente and his co-defendants’ innocence, which is the purpose behind making the film.

“At the risk of sounding like I’m following in the footsteps of Errol Morris and his ground-breaking film ‘The Thin Blue Line’ ” — which prompted Texas death row inmate Randall Dale Adams’ exoneration — “I guess I am, except we’re engaging in an Internet-driven community-funded effort, not only to make the film but to help exonerate the inmate. It’s Justice 3.0 — and we couldn’t even think about doing it without Kickstarter,” Trotter explained.

The film will be shot on location in North Dakota on high-definition video and will be comprised of interviews with key participants in the case from both sides of the judicial aisle, intercut with archival materials.

“The interest and outpouring of support has been amazing not only from the Native American defendants and their families, but also from those who investigated and prosecuted the case on behalf of the federal government,” Trotter said. “Enough time has passed and people who previously felt intimidated or unwilling or unable to speak are ready to come forward tell their side of the story. We’re very excited at the potential of combining film and social media to make a difference,” he said.

LeDena LaFuente urges anyone interested in her father’s case, as well as the documentary, to visit the project’s Kickstarter page, which features a short video and also has links to a dedicated website for the film.

“We really want people to visit the Facebook page, ‘Incident at Devils Lake - A Documentary Feature,’ and the Twitter feed. The Facebook page hasn’t been up all that long, and it already has more than 1,100 ‘likes.’ The really spells out my father’s case, and has lots of documents and statements which show that he is innocent.”